A sensor is a device which measures a physical quantity and converts it into a signal which can be read by an observer or by an instrument. When referring to its capability of detecting a parameter in one form and reporting it in another (usually an electrical or digital signal), a sensor is sometimes referred to as a “transducer” in the art.
The industry and manufacturers move towards networked, preferably wireless systems for sensor connectivity to enhance automation and to lower life cycle costs. Furthermore, the military moves towards such networked sensors to improve condition-based maintenance. Sensor interoperability also plays a crucial role in applications such as remote monitoring, situation awareness, or geographic information systems known as sensor webs. By sensor web is meant an amorphous architecture of spatially distributed sensor platforms, so-called pods, that wirelessly communicate with each other to facilitate environmental monitoring and control.
Widespread industry standards for sensor interfacing are defined as IEEE 1451.2. Smart sensors, i.e. devices that include communications and signal processing capabilities in addition to the actual transducer, typically build upon these standards. Advanced implementations of the IEEE 1451 standards are known which support the transmission of sensor data according to World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) standards and recommendations such as HTTP or SOAP. One such implementation was published by the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology at the OMG-Robotics Working Group meeting in December 2006.
A downside of the known solution is its inability to transfer sensor and application data in a single network message. This makes it difficult to incorporate the transmission of sensor data into complex solution architectures with multiple interacting applications. An object of the invention is thus to propose an improved approach to sensor data transmission using state-of-the-art network protocols.